Earlier this year at CES, ASUS showed off a high-end workstation board called the P9X79-E WS. The board is meant for Sandy Bridge-E processors, but will likely be compatible with Ivy Bridge-E as well. Unlike Wolverine and Zeus, the P9X79-E WS is a motherboard that will actually see the light of day and has been officially launched. It will be available sometime in May at an as-yet-unannounced price.

The P9X79-E hosts a single LGA 2011 processor, up to 64GB of 2400MHz DDR3, the Intel X79 PCH, and support for 4-Way SLI or CrossFire on four of its seven total PCI-E 3.0 slots. The workstation board uses a 10-layer PCB, ASUS DIGI+ with 10+2 power phases, DR Power PSU monitoring, ASUS SSD Caching II, solid capacitors, and fanless heatsinks connected via copper heatpipes.

Storage options include six SATA 6Gbps ports, four SATA II 3Gbps ports, and two eSATA ports coming from the front panel header. The rear IO has changed a bit since the board seen at CES, however. The now-official ASUS P9X79-E WS includes the following rear IO options:

1 x PS/2 combo port

10 x USB 2.0 ports (one can be used for BIOS flashing)

2 x USB 3.0 ports

2 x eSATA ports

2 x Gigabit Ethernet ports backed by Intel i210 GbE controller

6 x Analog audio ports

1 x Optical S/PDIF port

The board can accommodate up to four dual slot graphics cards or seven single slot expansion cards (like PCI-E SSDs and RAID controllers). As a workstation board, it is likely to be pricey, but for those that need 4-way SLI and LGA 2011 (possibly for Ivy Bridge-E though its hard to say for sure if that will work yet) it is shaping up to be a good option. As mentioned above, the P9X79-E WS will reportedly be available for purchase in about a month. Sometime in early May or late April, according to Slash Gear.

ASUS is showing off a new flagship X79 motherboard at CES called the P9X79-E WS. The workstation-class board is packed with hardware and ready to take Intel’s socket 2011-based Sandy Bridge-E processors to the extreme. The P9X79-E WS is of the E-ATX variety and features a LGA 2011 socket nestled between eight DDR3 DIMM slots. The board can support a maximum of 64GB clocked at 2400 MHz. An eight-pin CPU power and standard 24-pin ATX connector supplies power to the board while ASUS’ 10+2 phase DIGI+ VRM delivers clean power to the processor and memory.

The P9X79-E WS uses the X79 PCH and features six SATA 6 Gbps ports and four SATA 3 Gbps ports. With seven total PCI-E 3.0 x16 expansion slots, the P9X79-E WS can support quad SLI or CrossfireX multi-GPU solutions.

While not quite as outlandish as the Zeus and Wolverine prototype motherboards ASUS showed off at Computex, the P9X79-E WS is a high-end board that should actually see the light of day. Unfortunately, ASUS has not released any official pricing or availability for its new flagship X79 motherboard yet. WCCF Tech has several close up photos of the ASUS board worth looking at as well.